SpaCeMonKeY UK

So, I'm back from Blackpool. :)

I suppose I ought to tell you all what I did at the convention. I keep thinking of things I want to mention, so I'm loathe to write anything. But it's probably time. :)

Quite a lot of my photos are online on one of my websites, so check out the Fun Factory. If you want to. :D

Enough emoticons, let's talk convention! The SG-5 convention was held at the Norbreck Hotel in Blackpool, which has hosted Star Trek conventions in the past (like Voyager: The Return), as well as the medical ODA¹ one. Bit of a difference..! It's a big slightly tatty in places hotel, but there's a lot more space than the Heathrow Park Hotel that SG-3 was held at.

We didn't stay at the Norbreck because it was too expensive; I booked rooms at the Bringewood Hotel². The success of this booking is slightly surprising, since I was working down a list of cheap B&B's that were relatively close to the Norbreck. It was the second one I tried - the first one was full. The lady sounded nice on the phone, and boy, she and her husband were really nice in person! It took us approximately 6 hours to get to Blackpool from
Leicester (it took about 3 to get back) due to several accidents on the M6, and they were worried about us! Aaaah...

The funniest thing about the place was that they thought it was cool that we were there to go to a Stargate convention! The bloke looked quite like Peter DeLuise, which made it even more amusing! He seemed to be a big Sci-Fi fan. He wanted us to ask Christopher Judge if he'd like to stay at his B&B, but unsusprisingly we didn't. :)

They gave us a bottle of wine each, too. Because the sinks' hot water taps stopped working when their boiler broke. Other things had hot water, so it wasn't a complete disaster, but it was a nice thought. Shame I don't drink alcoholic beverages! But hey, I'll find someone who does!

Anyway, we were a bit late on the Saturday because we had to eat our lovely breakfasts. Plus the B&B proprietors kept asking if things were okay and talking to us about... well, Stargate. Heh....!

We sat there all day (ouch) and listened to the guests. After sitting there all day we were up for some exercise by the time the break came around, so we set off to visit Starr Gate tram terminus. That's all the way down the other end of the promenade. I like riding on things like trams, so I enjoyed it even if the people I was with didn't! At Starr Gate I felt compelled to take a picture to prove it existed, then we decided to get some food rather than get the tram straight back. With hindsight, this may have been a mistake...

We walked back to the Pleasure Beach, where I ate a lukewarm undefined meat and potato pie and chips and drank some evilly strong coffee. Then we decided to get the tram back. But oh no, disaster! The trams were all full! So we thought we'd walk part of the way and see if we could catch a tram later. Unfortunately, we ended up walking 6 miles (9km) back to the Norbreck. Well, walking and skipping. Heh. But it was nice to walk along the beach and soak up the atmosphere (and drizzle).

Incidentally, what's all the fuss about the illuminations? Sure, there are a lot of lightbulbs, but... Really odd. Some of the huge illuminated billboard type displays are obviously ancient. There's even a My Little Pony one! And that's not the oldest! The illumination subjects were bizarre. There was a fat boxing alien with Rocky written on his tummy - I don't remember Sly Stallone being a fat alien. Hmmm....

When we finally got back, Mark changed into his dress blues and Ali and I collapsed. Then we watched the Fancy Dress contestants and eventually found space on a table with some Dutch fans. Before long we decided we weren't enjoying it much, so we left. It was too loud to make new friends, and the music was pretty awful. Oh well.

We had tea at the B&B and went to sleep. Mmmm, sleep.

Sunday we were still late even though the stuff started later. This was because we were leaving so we ended up talking to the nice B&B people for quite a while! I showed them some of the photos on my camera. That sort of thing. It was incredibly windy trying to walk from the car to the Norbreck: I had to run forwards, otherwise I ended up being blown backwards. Eek! And apparently the rest of the country was worse. Weird English weather. :)

Hours of excellent guest talks later, we queued for Chris Judge, Lynn Smith (locations manager) and N John Smith's (producer) autographs. Lynn and John Smith were clearly really enjoying it. Understandably Chris was slightly jaded, but being that close to him actually made me a bit shaky..! I bought a rather funky Teal'c print to get signed (part of it's my birthday present, woo!) and also got him to sign the cover from my Action Man video. This confused the minder ("Were you in this?") and amused Chris ("How did
you know about that? I've never seen one of these!"), so it was kinda fun. :D

Then we had some more talks (including holding time of Chris Judge, Garwin Sanford and JR Bourne's bottoms being auctioned - 30s of Chris's went for £350!), before grabbing some food, and getting the rest of the guests' autographs. (I had my programme signed.) And then it was the closing ceremony (where holding time of Jacqueline's bottom was auctioned). And then we went home. We were all very tired.

So, that's what happened, but I expect what you really want to know is what the talks were about.

I couldn't be bothered to write this all out in a huge narrative, so I've made points. And there's no way I could cover everything! And the stuff in the guests' sections wasn't necessarily said by the guest whose section it is. It's just about that person. If you know what I mean!

Christopher Judge (Teal'c)

He doesn't know how much longer he'll act for - he wants to be able to eat and drink!
He's only lost one job because of Stargate, as far as he knows. It was for the part of an undercover cop, and they said he looked too much like the guy from Stargate. Heh.
The one scene that he thinks defines Teal'c is the one from Redemption where he's sitting on the steps with Rya'c.
When he was acting on Gabriel's Fire he was called into James Earl Jones's trailer. He thought he was going to be complimented on his great acting, but he was chastised for overacting! He was told the following words of wisdom, "Let stillness be your strength".
His favourite Stargate episode is the Season 6 episode Changeling, which he wrote. He's brought back as many people from previous episodes as he could! He originally pitched an episode about the Amazon Women, but that didn't get very far... The episode asks the question of what things would be like if Teal'c had been born on Earth. It sounds great!
He would most like to duet with Mary J Blige and sing Marvin Gaye's "What's going on".
Other songs he likes a lot include Robbie Williams's "Angels".
His heros are Mohammed Ali and streetchildren.
He justified Teal'c's "hot alien love" in Crossroads. (Teal'c had been years without "hot alien love" and his wife and remarried!) He also told us a related Jaffa joke: "What does a Jaffa priestess do when she wakes up? Goes home."
He did a demonstration of "puff and ruffle", where all the men on set try to make themselves look manly to attract female guest stars. (The women "puff and ruffle" too, apparently!)
If he could choose to be in anything, he'd love to be in Matrix Reloaded.
He answered questions as Teal'c. Teal'c's favourite TV programme is (apparently) Temptation Island..!
He had long hair when he auditioned for the part of Teal'c, and he didn't think he'd got the part, so he shaved his hair off. And then he was called back. But they liked the bald look, so it was decided he couldn't have any hair until Season 3. When Season 3 came around, they said he still couldn't have hair. But he kept his blond caterpillar beard as a matter of principle...
And finally, the bear story! He was playing golf one day with one of the Stargate crew, and he hit a great shot. He spun around in joy and discovered he was face to face with a bear! Suffice to say he was very scared. Michael Shanks decided to use this, so when they were filming he kept looking around like he'd heard things. Chris grew increasingly nervous and mistook a grip digging in a ditch wearing a black hat and coat for a bear. He nearly ran off of a cliff. (When Chris tells the story the man's wearing a big fur coat...!)

JR Bourne (Martouf)

Chris Judge says he has a, "skinny little white boy arse".
Many people commented on his long hair - usually to say it's a wig. (Which it's not!) He got us to vote on whether we liked it more than his short hair.
He kept making us do Mexican waves so that he could take action shots of us.
He talked about Thirteen Ghosts, mostly about the cast he had made for his death scene. He had to pull the sort of face you pull when you get sliced in half so that they could make a cast. He wanted to take the cast home, maybe drive it around in his car. :)
He's just made a film with Amanda Tapping called Stuck. It takes place entirely in a lift!
When he was filming Futuresport he had a great tattoo on his face, and they thought they'd save time by having him leave it on overnight. He tried to stay really still, but when he got up there was black everywhere! He left it on to show the makeup people that their idea wasn't the best in the world. He was a mess.
If he could play one person in Stargate he'd play everyone else in Divide and Conquer and also the writers in an attempt to keep his character alive!

Peter Williams (Apophis)

He has a degree in Geography and Archaeology from Nottingham University in the UK.
But he's originally from Jamaica.
As a Jamaican he's always wanted to play Bob Marley. He's auditioned three or four times, but the film's never made.
He originally for the part of Teal'c, but got the job of Apophis because he looked a bit like Jaye Davidson (Ra in the film).
He does an interesting Desmond Tutu impression!

Marshall Teague (Frank Cromwell)

He has several stories about the time he spent filming on The Rock. He's hard of hearing, so he once spent 11 minutes guarding a piece of real estate when everyone else had gone to lunch. He also grabbed Sean Connery in an unfortunate place because he tried to surface when they were going to blast fire over the top of the water. (He feared for his job!)
He toured NASA when he was preparing for Armageddon. He saw how the astronauts were preparing for working on the space station - memorising the surface by touch. And he got to sit in a space shuttle.
He reckons his voice was a lot higher at the end of A Matter of Time because he spent three days hanging in a harness!

Gary Jones (Master Sergeant Davis aka Chevron Guy!)

He's written a lot of comedy, including JR Bourne's character on Big Sound.
Peter DeLuise has made him do lots of silly things, including drinking Peptobismol (?sp) in the background of a scene and telling General Hammond to "open his own iris"..!
He has perfected "reaching and grabbing". He has to pretend he's operating a whole load of buttons and switches!
It doesn't take him long to memorise his lines. ("Yes Sir"?)
When he auditioned he thought he had the part, since Mario (the director) thought he was perfect. So he read the lines in a silly voice. Thankfully they thought that the silly voice was a good thing, since he was the only person who'd put effort into the reading of "Chrevron one encoded" etc! By the time the pilot came round, they had to keep telling him to tone it down. Eventually he was so toned down that he sighed. They told him not to sigh. :D
He has to deliver his lines to the glass. Sometimes he has to tell General Hammond something really exciting, and he thinks he'll get to turn round and deliver his lines, but they tell him to look over his shoulder, check Hammond's there, and then say the lines to the glass. Aaah...
Sometimes things get really exciting and he sits in a different chair.
He has also been told (sometimes) to deliver his lines in the style of William Shatner. He does a hilarious impression!
His character has no real name. O'Neill has called him Walter, but he can't be called Walter Davis because there's a Walter Davis somewhere that objects. At the moment his name badge reads "Norman Davis".
Once he was promoted (given more ribbons). The costume department were keen to see if he'd noticed, but he hadn't. :)
He does a very funny impression of Don S Davis after fluffing his lines. ("I'm sorry.")
When asked "boxers or briefs" he answered military issue thong. Eep!
He's HILARIOUS!!!

Douglas Arthurs (Heru-ur)

I can't really remember much about his talks. Eek! I think he was the guest who said they liked British Sci-Fi, namely Red Dwarf and Doctor Who.

Jay Acovone (Kawalsky)

I can't remember much of what Jay said either. He didn't seem anywhere near as lively as he was at SG-3.
He reiterated how he felt about being killed in the second episode. For those of you who don't know, Kawalsky was originally supposed to be played by the film actor, so they wrote it so that he wouldn't have to be in it for long. But then he dropped out, and Jay got the part, but the first ten episodes or so were already written. So they couldn't change it so that he didn't die. :(
I think he also told us about torturing Mulder in The X-Files. Mwahahaha.

Jacqueline Samuda (Nirrti)

She gets really excited because she thinks she's going to be in episodes a lot, then it turns out she's invisible...
In an upcoming episode she gets to take each of the SG-1 team into a room and have her way with them. :D
She reckons that Nirrti does everything she does for good. Nirrti thinks she's benefitting mankind by helping evolution along. She would never admit she's bad.
I think she was the guest who mentioned the "Teal'c mirror". All the guest stars do a Teal'c impression, and the photos are stuck round a mirror in makeup.

Garwin Sanford (Narim)

He talked at some length about his "underwear epiphany". This stemmed from the frequently asked question, "boxers or briefs". Apparently when he was a student he washed all his clothes apart from the jeans and top he was wearing. While the things were being washed, he decided that it was far more comfortable to go commando. He no longer went along with society's lies! He says this "underwear epiphany" was a defining moment in his life. Heh.
He was very annoyed with JR Bourne, since when he came back to Stargate, hoping to rekindle romance with Carter, he discovered she had a thing for Martouf. He asked a question about this during JR's talk. Oh, and he kept calling Martouf "Melmak". Which was odd. :)
In Enigma he was wearing what he called a "body condom". The suit zipped up at the back, and was really hot. Not only that, but it was an inch too short so he kept hunching over. Having to hug a really hot cat didn't help matters! So when he came back to Stargate they gave him pyjamas to wear instead. :)
He seems to have an interesting opinion of Narim. He calls him a "wet noodle" stalker.
One of his worst acting jobs ever was on Dark Angel. The part he auditioned for (and got) was one of a scientist. When he got the script, he couldn't find himself in it. It turned out that his part had changed to that of a large breasted priest? I'm sure that's what he said! It was definitely a priest, anyway..!

N John Smith and Lynn Smith (Producer and Locations Manager)

A blooper reel has been prepared. Hopefully it should make it onto DVD in the near future!
Season 7 is "98.5%" likely. Richard Dean Anderson has said he'll do it, it just needs a few things to be ironed out.³
The rating for Abyss (Michael Shanks's guest starring return) was the lowest of Season 6 - 1.5 instead of regular 1.8's.
They sold the show to Sci-Fi with the 1.5 rating, so they're doing better than they expected!

That's about all I can remember at the moment. A final interesting fact is that a memo has been issued regarding Corin Nemec. Apparently he's no longer allowed to eat or use props unless specifically required by the script! He had to eat about 40 bananas because the banana "didn't look right". There are only so many takes you can do before you get fed up with it, but the eating was good! :)

¹ Operating Department Assistant.

² The Bringewood Hotel: King Edward Avenue, Blackpool, FY2 9TD; tel: 01253 351728.

³ I know there has been some confusion over this. People are quoting Hank Cohen (MGM President) and saying that Season Seven won't happen. Mr Cohen said, "Regretfully, it was incorrectly stated at an event in the [United Kingdom] that Stargate SG-1 was a firm go for a seventh season." John Smith never said that, he's been misquoted to Hank Cohen. He just said it was looking increasingly likely! He'd been hoping to have a definite answer over the weekend, but no such luck. And as he's a producer, I'm inclined to believe what he said over the words of the MGM President reacting to misquoted information!

0 Comments: